hypothetical_eventsfandomcom-20200215-history
Collapse of Julius Tower
This event takes place in 2015. Timeline of Collapse The Julius Tower is a building located in Miami. The building is 195 meters tall and has 61 floors and is located in downtown Miami. The collapse took place on August 24 2015. 4 days after category 5 Hurricane Henri hitting Miami at a peak intensity of 921 mbar. One of the most intense hurricanes to ever strike the States. The Julius Tower is a normal rectangular tower with glass windows and offices on all 61 floors and has a hotel on floors 57 to 60. The Julius Tower was meant to handle hurricanes, But Hurricane Henri was not just a regular hurricane. On August 20 2015 at 7:12 pm, Henri had made landfall as a cat 5. The building did relatively fine. After all it was designed for situations like this. Some windows were shattered as wind and rain hammered the building. However on August 21st at 9:31 am a tree near the tower had uprooted and struck the tower on the 54th floor destroying the staircase and creating an open hole on the south side. Some worked in the building to get the tree out of the way while some were in the hotel. Everyone on the 54th floor and above were stuck meaning that some 100 people in the hotel would be stranded. Nothing woud change until August 23rd at 2:58 pm when lightning somehow by a miracle struck exactly in the hole of the building hitting the tree which starting a fire. The hurricane also strengthened into cat 3 intensity and damages got worse. With the fire getting intense and spreading to floors 54-56 it seemed certain that the buildings end was near. The building was started to tilt as pieces of the fire affected floors started to fall apart and the building started to lean to the south east side at the 14th floor. While most from floors 0 to 52 succesfully evacuated. Most of those on the hotel floors were stuck. Helicopters arrived but they could not rescue people as part of the roof collapsed too Helicopters remained on the scene until the building was near collapse. AT 1:33 am on August 24th the building started to lean more, the fire was still going on although not as severe. Soon the 54th floor collapsed taking down some of the floors below until the building lost balance and snapped causing it to fall over and destroy the entire structure killing a total of 117 people(including some on ground). The collapse of the Julius Tower was a shock to many especially with the owner of the building claiming it would withstand hurricanes. The most inspiring story of a survivor of this collapse is that of 23 year old Amanda Smith. Amanda was on the fire affected 54th floor when wind blew her and she fell on the 53rd floor breaking her hand and left hip. This attracted the attention of 35 year old Michael Phillips who worked on the 51st floor who saw Amanda injured badly. Phillips went up to the 53rd floor and carried Smith down to the ground until he found some navy members trying to rescue anyone left near the building. Amanda is the only person who survived who was on one of the trapped floors.